Will reinstall delete existing files?

Ultraclassic194 · Sep 15, 2008

On a recent reboot from my desktop screen, I was confronted with a user login screen that asked for a password. I've never use a password for access, nor did I set my PC up this way. Don't know how it happened, but with no password, I can't get it. Dell says that I must reinstall my operating system. They also say that, unlike windows XP, a reinstallation will overwrite all of my existing files/folders. Is this true?

Barman58 · Sep 15, 2008

hello ultraclassic194, and welcome to the forums :party:

,

The basic answer to your question is yes and no if you are using the restore to factory settings system supplied by a manufacturer then this will over-write everything and restore the machine to how it was when it left the factory.

If you do a restore using a vista disk then an upgrade install will allow you to still access your old files although the preferred method of vista install is a clean install.

However saying this all may not be lost before we get to a re-install if you have a look here you can download an image of a bootable CD-ROM which will allow you to reset your password.

depending on your confidence with this you may want to get some local assistance with the creation and use of this CD. if you feel OK about doing it yourself post back with any questions and someone will I'm sure assist you with it.

Ultraclassic194 · Sep 15, 2008

Thanks Barman58,

I was going to use the Dell vista operating system restoration disk (which they say will do a full install if I get a new hard drive). I was just checking the Dell site and came to these warnings on the reinsatall of vista.

"Be sure to create a backup of all data before reinstalling the operating system. Reinstalling the operating system results in the complete erasure of all data."

and,

"Dell does not recommend reinstalling Microsoft Windows over an existing version without formatting the hard drive. Depending on the system configuration and applications that were previously installed, a number of problems may occur by not formatting the hard drive before reinstalling."

Looks like I'll loose everything.

My backup is to install a new hard drive. Then, put the old drive in the expansion bay and try to read the data files.

Do you think this'll work?

Barman58 · Sep 15, 2008

should work fine, only thing i can see that may cause a problem is the permissions on the files on the old drive.

What I would do is remove old drive so that it can't be seen by the install, install onto the new drive from the dell disk(s), and ensure everything is working OK. I would probably create a additional admin account with a password. write down the password and put this somewhere safe.

This is your get out of trouble account in case the same problem happens to your new install.

Only when you are sure that everything is working correctly with your new install would I reconnect the old drive you should then be able to access the Users directory structure and your old files. If you have problems accessing the files you may need to "Take Ownership" of them (they will still be "owned" by your original user) . This is all explained in this Tutorial

Good luck any problems post back and well try our best to help

I would recommend anyone new to vista to check out the Tutorial Section here which is full of useful, proven, information.

SIW2 · Sep 15, 2008

Hi.

You can easily view your password ( provided it is 14 characters or less - probably is ) using this program.

1) Download this free iso file onto a working machine

SourceForge.net: Downloading ...

2) Download free IMGBURN from here

The Official ImgBurn Website

3) Use free IMGBURN to burn the downloaded iso to a recordable cd/dvd - takes 3mins - see this tutorial

How to write an image file to a disc with ImgBurn - ImgBurn Support Forum

Only thing to remember is don't format the cd - if autoplay pops up, click the red X at the top of it's box to close it.

4) Boot cd into the machine you want to find the password for, it's very easy, see here

Screenshot Tour: How to crack a Windows password with Ophcrack Live CD

Hope this works for you

SIW2

Click the middle icon at top left of this post to comment if it helped

Ultraclassic194 · Sep 17, 2008

Thanks SIW2,

I tried the ophcrack download and it isn't working for me.

I also, had problems with imgburn, but I was able to install and use InfraRecorder
to make the cd.

uberdownloads - Downloading InfraRecorder 0.44.1

As for ophcrack, I didn't get the screens that your link indicated I would get. I have attached the main screen and the option screen. The rest were all text.

I'll keep trying to resolve this. If you have any additional suggestions, I'm open.

Barman58 · Sep 17, 2008

Hi Ultraclassic194,

Are you on a dual boot system? Just that the screens you post show 2 installs of windows, If you have a dual boot with XP for example then there are 2 versions of Ophcrack one for vista and one for XP, using the vista version on an XP install or Vice versa will cause problems. are you selecting the correct partition? try running on both and see if you get more success.

the disc I recommended in my first post is the same for all versions of windows from NT onwards so if you don't have any luck with Ophcrack then you may want to give it a try. It doesn't have a graphic interface but I have found it to work. I have several of these types of boot disks in my toolkit, including Ophcrack, so if you are still having problems I'll try to dig out some links for alternatives.

SIW2 · Sep 17, 2008

Hi Nigel

Sorry , wasn't trying to override the sound advice in your original post - just thought ophcrack might be the easiest for Ultrclassic to try first.

Let's hope it works for him following the suggestions you just posted.

Strange he couldn't get Imgburn to work - wonder if that was just a bad download or indicative of other problems.

Do you know of anything that will get Windows product key off a dead drive ? I already suggested magical jelly bean - but that is only for 32bit.

Thanks

SIW2

Barman58 · Sep 17, 2008

Hi SIW2, no problems I don't get territorial :D
the more people of suggest an answer the more likely the OP will solve the problem, the fact that there are two windows installs found by Ophcrack suggests it may not be totally simple

As for your Dead Drive you could have a look at this haven't used it myself but clams to work with x64

the other option might be Ultimate Windows Boot CD I think it has a key finder included but don't have a copy handy to check.

SIW2 · Sep 17, 2008

Hi,

Thanks - had looked at UBCD, and apart from being a tricky animal, it includes only the magical jelly bean for this job - sadly just works on 32bit.

You can find/reset Admin password with UBCD, but seems to be no way of recovering x64 Product Key from dead drive.

The rjsoftware prog. gets a red light from McAfee and was replaced on this Forum in the product key tutorial by SIW. In any case it seems to only work on a current installation.

This is turning out to be quite a hunt !

Any other suggestions gratefully received .

SIW2

Barman58 · Sep 17, 2008

I hate to say this but the only sure way is the professional data recovery companies.
the thing is with them is you need a NASA like budget to afford them :D:

D

the thing is when a drive gets to paperweight level you have to judge if the data on the drive is worth the cost of a recovery. I would doubt if the cost of a windows licence would justify the recovery cost.

one other way is a trawl through the Linux communities to see if anyone has developed a key recoverer which could be added to a live CD, its the way a lot of boot CDs work anyway.

just had a thought - the DATA is on the drive and I think it's stored in the registry in the clear. I think i have a copy of a boot cd somewhere which includes a registry editor and may prove useful - will have a look and post back.

edit

Have a look at this if you know where to find the info in the registry it may be a solution

SIW2 · Sep 17, 2008

Hi Nigel,

Check this out, the author claims it works on Vista too - if that's true, just need to find a way of copying the registry from the dead install to a live one , so it can be worked on later ?

Windows XP and Vista Product Key Recovery · Dagon Design

Author suggests Loadhive - have you come across this , or similar ?

SIW2

Ultraclassic194 · Sep 17, 2008

Thanks for the insight Barman58.

No, it's not a dual boot system (at least not that I know of). It's just a home/office Dell PC with Vista Home Premium. It's entirely possible that I used an incompatable version of the iso software. As a side note, it took over an hour for the iso package to download from the web. This seemed like a long time, althought my download rate was pretty low.

As to getting everything to run, I was working from my old computer (now my wife's) which is XP based, and I was having problems in too may ways to list. It was getting late and I was tired/frustrated.

The problem with imgburn was that it wasn't seeing my cd burner. But, in retrospect, neither was InfraRecorder at first. And InfrarRecorder doesn't launch automatically by right clicking on the iso icon. But, I think I burned the disk correctly.

I'll re-engage with your recommendations again in the next few days and let you know how it goes.

Still optimistic...Ultraclassic194

Barman58 · Sep 17, 2008

ok ultraclasic194,

will await your news with interest and I understand the Tired/Frustrated feeling very well :D

siw2,
not heard of loadhive before but does look like a useful app :D it's now in my toolkit - will try it out next time I visit someone with a corrupt install who's lost their key, it does happen quite often

.

as for copying the registry the complication is its not a single file but is split over various System.dat and User.dat files, you may want to look on technet or MSDN to see if you can find a definitive list.

just found an in-depth article on Wikipedia that may help
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Registry#Backups_and_recovery

SIW2 · Sep 18, 2008

Don't suppose you tried just hitting the Enter key once when it asked for your password ?

Only mention it because I flash upgraded my BIOS recently - it then asked for a password when I tried to enter BIOS.

This must be a feature of the default settings that had been triggered by the upgrade.

Since I had not set up a password, I figured it must be a blank, so I hit the Enter key once and I was in.

Hope it's that simple

SIW2

Ultraclassic194 · Sep 18, 2008

SIW2 and Barman58,

First I verified that I have the correct version of ophcrack (ophcrack-vista-livecd-2.0.1).

Then, I redownloaded the imgburn and this time it ran fine. I had trouble burning to a CD-R disk. I tried two disks and kept getting and I/O Error in one particular sector (204611) during the sector verify process. I switched to a DC-RW and it wrote fine.

But, still bad news as ophcrack still didn't work as advertised. I got the same screens as before.

I'm still concerned that it took almost 2 hours to download ophcrack (I'm on cable!). So on the chance that I have a bad file, I'm going to redownload ophcrack and try again. So I'll report back next Monday, hopefully.

Thanks again to both of you for the vectors.....

SIW2 · Sep 19, 2008

Hi

Thanks for that. You might like to check this out for your toolbox - doesn't happen often I guess, but handy to have when it does

Atola Technology » Archive » Restoring Factory Hard Drive Capacity

Dunno if you have the vLite 1.1.6 , but it could be disappearing soon - very handy for slipstreaming SP2 when it comes and for making bootable iso of Vista files - worth a google to grab it before it's gone - v1.2 is available, but not so good as it needs gigantic Waik download from Microsoft.

SIW2

Ultraclassic194 · Sep 29, 2008

Barman58 and SIW2,

Just a note to follow up as promised. I never go the password recovery to work. I guess it's because Vista corrupted itself.

I did remove the drive from my pc and installed it in a stand-alone enclosure. I can read all of my data files just fine. So nothing lost, but time.

I'm installing a new HDD and doing some upgrades at the same time.

Thanks for the help.....Ultraclassic 194

Will reinstall delete existing files?

New Member

My Computer

My Computers

New Member

My Computer

My Computers

My Computers

New Member

Attachments

My Computer

My Computers

My Computers

My Computers

My Computers

My Computers

My Computers

New Member

My Computer

My Computers

My Computers

New Member

My Computer

My Computers

New Member

My Computer